


I'm Sorry - Don't Go

by orphan_account



Series: TWDG Writing Challenge [17]
Category: The Walking Dead & Related Fandoms, The Walking Dead (Telltale Video Game)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, But she does get better eventually :), Character Study, F/F, Gen, Graphic Description, Gunshot Wounds, It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better, Violet is only mentioned though, i described what i think Clem must've felt when she got shot in season 2, okay i think that's enough tags its just a drabble, poor clem, well so is Lee but he's a main character in this story so he gets a tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-17
Updated: 2019-11-17
Packaged: 2021-02-07 23:50:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 721
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21466558
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Day 17 - She'll say it over and over again; even when he can't hear it.
Relationships: Clementine & Lee Everett, Clementine/Violet (Walking Dead: Done Running)
Series: TWDG Writing Challenge [17]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1533260
Comments: 1
Kudos: 47





	I'm Sorry - Don't Go

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: "I'm sorry."
> 
> Wow when I was writing this I honestly didn't plan to write it so angsty.
> 
> Also I'm pretty sure Richmond is in Virginia but if I'm wrong I'm going to feel so embarrassed. I looked it up and everything.

Clementine is nine, and she's mourning.

Still reeling from the aftermath of the biggest mistake in her entire life so far, she walks.

She walks (and walks and walks and walks and-) until her legs are too tired to carry her anymore, and she is forced to rest against an old, rotten log in the middle of a beautiful, yet tragically abandoned field.

"I'm sorry, Lee."

She whimpers those words out to nobody but herself. She's too exhausted to cry anymore, but her shoulders still shake as though she's desperately trying to.

She shakes so hard that the gun in her hand falls to the ground, but she can't bring herself to care about it. She needs it, but she wants a new one. She doesn't know how to feel about having to carry around the same weapon that she had used to end Lee's life.

She thought she was getting used to the way guns felt. But this one... it's just so, so heavy now. Too heavy.

She can still smell the gun residue.

###### 

Clementine is eleven, and she's scared.

She's been shot - a hot, blinding pain had suddenly engulfed her, and it _hurts_.

She's on the ground but the heat from the bullet is almost distracting her from the cold of the snow.

She can't tell if she's bleeding, but she doesn't bother to look. She doesn't want to focus on it. She _can't_ really focus on it.

Her mind is elsewhere, screaming yet filled with an eerie calmness at the same time.

"I'm sorry, Lee, please help me."

She's panicking. She doesn't know why she's apologizing, but she feels like she has to. She feels like crying. She wants to.

She wants to wail and sob and cry and wail, until her body gives out and she's forced to continue her sobs in her dreams, but it hurts too much. She doesn't get the chance to either.

Her body really does give out before she's able to. Everything in her vision starts blurring, then fading, then turning black. At least the pain stops.

The last thing she hears is the vague sounds of an enraged Kenny.

###### 

Clementine is thirteen, and she's determined.

Dr. Lingard had just told her the whereabouts of AJ, so now she's walking down the many streets of Virginia, a woman on a mission.

She hasn't been there for the boy like she should have. She let the New Frontier walk all over her, and had let them take AJ away. She had barely put up a fight.

She knows better now, and she'll be damned if she makes the same mistakes twice.

"Fuck," she whispers to herself when she checks her gun and realizes that she's running low on ammo.

"Sorry, Lee."

An afterthought. She smiles to herself, the apologizing habit bringing her a twinge of nostalgia.

She marches forward with a new spring in her step. AJ is what she's been fighting for all this time, and she's so close now. The idea of reuniting with him bringing her a rush of excitement.

_Keep moving forward. Keep moving forward. Keep moving forward._

A mantra. It keeps her going.

###### 

Clementine is seventeen, and she's content.

She's laying in bed with AJ slightly snoring in the bed next to hers.

It's been a week since the defeat of Delta. A week since she rescued her friends and everyone had made it out of the chaos alive.

She's happy. She's relatively healthy. She's content.

She's in a home that she can finally call her own. She's surrounded by friends, she has her family with her, and she has a wonderful girlfriend that she looks forward to seeing everyday. There's no other place she'd rather be right now.

This might be the closest she'll get to feeling like she's on top of the world.

Her thoughts trail off to Lee, and she thinks about everything he's ever taught her, and everything he's ever done for her.

She wishes she could've done more for him in return, but the best she can do right now is to keep his rules close to her heart, and to follow them to the best of her ability.

But when she thinks about one specific rule he had - "Always keep moving" - she smiles to herself.

"Sorry, Lee."

_This is where I belong._

**Author's Note:**

> Happy endings are best endings!
> 
> I hope you enjoyed reading! :)


End file.
